


Forget

by bev_crusher1971



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Gen, HP: TGOF, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 10:08:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13292598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bev_crusher1971/pseuds/bev_crusher1971
Summary: While Severus wandered through Hogwarts at night, he found something he didn't expect.





	Forget

**Author's Note:**

> I was watching HP TGOF again tonight and when Harry brought Cedric's body back and was crying so much, I thought how nice it would be if someone would comfort him. 
> 
> This was not beta-ed as I wrote it in about two hours. It was something that simply demanded to be written. Please let me know when you find something I missed. It's almost two in the morning. ;)
> 
> IMPORTANT: This is NO UNDERAGE fic. It's a simple hurt/comfort, so don't expect anything else!!! I simply chose the relationship because this story is mainly about Harry and Severus and their feelings.

After the Dementors had taken Barty Crouch junior back to Azkaban, Severus wandered the lonely halls of Hogwarts, deeply lost in thought. Voldemort was back. He had always known that it had only been a matter of time. But to hear it, to feel the pull of the dark mark on his arm, and get summoned to that Cemetery … it had been frightening. 

When he heard the clock at the tower chime in the distance, he counted the strikes. Three. It was three in the morning. His feet were heavy, his bones weary and he was deadly tired. 

Deadly. 

Dead. 

Like Cedric. It had almost broken his heart to see Potter so devastated about the young man's loss. His cries, his tears, his sobbing had gone straight to his heart. And yes, thank you, he had a heart, indeed. When he passed one of the alcoves hidden in the dark, he heard a muffled sound. Immediately on high alert, he reached for his wand and silently walked closer to the alcove. Very, very carefully, he reached for the curtain covering it, and held his breath as he pulled it aside with vim, his wand raised. 

And let it sink again, with a surprised sound. 

“Potter,” he mumbled, as he stared into the tear-stained face of the 14-year-old. 

“Professor,” the kid gasped and jumped up, trying in vain to wipe away his tears. “I … I … “

“Shouldn't you be in bed by now?” Severus asked, giving his voice the hard edge the young Gryffindor was used to hear from him. It had the desired effect. The tears seemed to subside and the disdain was back in the kid's eyes. 

“Yes, Sir,” he murmured, but suddenly all defiance left his eyes, and Severus could watch him crumble before his eyes. “Why can't you just show at least a little bit of sympathy, sir?” he whispered, and again a tear trickled down his cheek. “Cedric just died, and you … you are …“

“I am what, Potter?” 

“Just like always, I guess,” Potter breathed, “I just wished that ...”

Severus couldn't understand the rest of the sentence, the boy's voice drifted off until he was simply moving his lips and no sound came out. 

“Wished what? How will you defeat the Dark Lord if you are unable to form one simple sentence, Potter?” he sneered. 

Potter took some deep breaths, and finally he blurted out, “I just wished that you would show some sympathy, sir. That just for once you would show that you have a heart and that maybe,” another deep breath and the voice grew again a little quieter, “maybe you would comfort m....someone when you see that the other one is in distress.”

With his head bowed, and tears slowly dropping on the floor, Severus could feel his heart melt. In his head, he was thrown back to an afternoon so many, many years ago when another kid had been standing before him, crying because her sister had once again been mean to her. 

Lily. Back then, he hadn't even thought twice about wrapping his arms around her, whispering comforting words in her ear, rocking her gently while she had cried her heart out, he tears soaking his shoulder. 

It must have been the vivid remembrance of that day which felt as if it had been in another life, that made him sigh deeply. 

“Oh Harry,” he moaned, and without thinking twice, he engulfed the young boy in his arms, pulling him close. “I am so, so sorry for everything you had to go through.” The body in his arms stiffened, and for a moment Severus was afraid that he might have made a terrible mistake, when suddenly Potter relaxed against him, his arms closed around his waist, and a dark head came to rest on his shoulder. Trusting, just like his mother had been. He pulled him even closer and within a heartbeat he apparated them both into his quarters, deep down in the dungeons. He knew that apparating inside Hogwarts was normally frowned upon by Dumbledore but he also knew that the headmaster would be able to recognize his signature, and would simply assume that Severus wanted to save time. 

The boy still clung to his midriff, refusing to let go, and Severus had to admit that he didn't want him to. Feeling Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, hug him like this, taking comfort from his embrace, it was a heady feeling. And on the other hand it settled something inside him. Some deep-seated longing to be *needed*. Just for himself. Not for what he could do or give or tell … but simply for who he was. 

“I was so afraid,” Potter finally mumbled after Severus had more or less carried him to his couch and had him draped over his lap. Green empty eyes stared into nothing while he uttered those words. A shuddering sigh escaped slightly parted lips. “Those last few weeks … they were a nightmare. I never *wanted* to be part of this bloody tournament. But no one believed me.”

He pushed himself a bit away, out of Severus' embrace and stared intently into his eyes. “Do you believe me?” he whispered, and Severus knew that his answer was important to the boy. So he nodded. “I believe you, Harry.” A smile flitted over Harry's face when Severus called him Harry. “Thank you, Professor,” he murmured and sank back against him. Slowly at first but then faster and faster, the words began to tumble out from the young man's mouth. He talked, and talked, and talked. He sobbed, cried, moaned, groaned, and when he finally came to an end, with the betrayal of Alistair Moody, alias Crouch Junior, Severus could feel the boy's exhaustion. “In the end,” he concluded his story barely audible, “in the end I am responsible that Voldemort came back.”

Severus could only shake his head at so much stupidity. Oh, that damned Gryffindor thinking. But before he could argue with him about that sentiment, Harry continued, “And it's my fault that Cedric mmph.”

It was at this point that Severus simply put his hand over Harry's mouth to stop him from talking. This caused the boy to move slightly up. “No, Harry,” Severus said strong and with conviction, “it is *not* your fault that Cedric Diggory is dead now. Do you understand me?” 

Potter's eyes were wide, and he nodded hesitantly. Slowly, he moved back and made himself comfortable again. Then he yawned, and Severus tried very hard not to find it adorable. 

“Rest, Harry,” he murmured softly, “you are safe now. I will take care of you.”

“Will you hold me a little while longer?” Harry mumbled, already on the brink of sleeping, “no one ever did that for me.”

Severus could feel his heart break a little more for Lily's son who would have deserved so much, and had gotten so little. 

“I will, Harry,” he answered, and softly stroked the boy's unruly hair. A few heartbeats later the body in his arms relaxed completely, and Harry feel asleep with his head on his potion professor's shoulder and his arms slung around him. 

'Oh, Lily', he thought with a deep sadness in his heart, 'when had everything begun to go so wrong? You should be here to look after him. He shouldn't carry all those heavy burdens. He should be free to learn, to love and maybe be as snappish as Draco. Instead he has to fight for his life every day. And who knows what else Dumbledore still has planned for him.'

Severus levitated himself and the precious cargo in his arms from his couch to the bed for the rest of the night. There he stayed awake, holding Harry Potter in his arms, comforting whenever nightmares seemed to plague him and he became restless. 

In the early hours of the following day, he cast one last long look at the boy. Tried to memorize it. With a wistful smile, he pressed one kiss to the scar on the boy's forehead, before he moved him to his own bed, casting a hiding spell around them so none of Harry's fellow class mates would notice them. 

Later, back in his quarters, he would remove this night from his memories so no one would ever find them. Maybe in a few years, or whenever all of this was over, he would be able to look back at this night if only in the pensieve. 

He allowed himself one last, almost gentle glance at the boy, then he swung his wand and murmured, “Obliviate!”

The end


End file.
